


Who Would You Miss The Most

by GalaxyGirl084



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Blood, Blood and Injury, Broken Bones, Cuts, Dark, Don't Like Don't Read, F/F, Help, Hurt Skye | Daisy Johnson, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Kidnapping, Medical Experimentation, Ouch, Skye | Daisy Johnson Needs a Hug, Skye | Daisy Johnson-centric, Surgery, Torture, skimmons - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:46:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28121109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalaxyGirl084/pseuds/GalaxyGirl084
Summary: Mid season 2 AU: Someone comes knocking on the cabin door, taking Skye away. The young inhuman finds herself reliving the very same trauma her own mother experienced so many years ago.
Relationships: Jemma Simmons & Skye | Daisy Johnson, Jemma Simmons/Skye | Daisy Johnson
Comments: 16
Kudos: 79





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, I'm back with a new story! I want to give credit to my co author, who would rather remain anonymous for this one! Trigger Warning! Blood, Torture, Language, etc. PLEASE READ TAGS BEFORE YOU CONTINUE!

Just days ago Skye was eating Twizzlers on a quinjet with Coulson. Now she is stuck in a cabin, unable to control the buzzing feelings beneath her skin. Sure, that man Gordon had shown up to give her some advice, and while it had helped, she still felt out of control. He told her he would return, but she just wanted to get back to Jemma. They’d call on a regular basis, and just talk, but Skye wanted to be able to hold her. She still wasn’t entirely sure of her feelings, nor if Jemma felt the same way, but all she knew was that she loved Jemma, whether as a sister, a girlfriend, or just a plain friend.

Tonight as she was sitting on the couch playing solitaire, her thoughts were entirely surrounding the biochemist. This made it an especially brutal surprise when she heard the rapping of knuckles on the lone door of the cabin. Skye was told that she would be notified before anyone showed up at the cabin, and as far as she knew, she had not been notified. Her heart racing, she grabbed her emergency gun, turning off the safety. As she made her way to the computer on the desk, the knocking grew into a crescendo. She craned her neck to peer out the window, and jumped backwards in spite of herself. Three men dressed in what she recognized as Hydra uniforms awaited her outside. Skye quickly clicked through the programs on the computer, and began to type an SOS message to her SHIELD team.

One man reached into his pack, pulling out what looked like a small metal device. Throwing it down onto the floor of the porch, he and the other two men ducked away as he pushed the button. Before she had a chance to send the full message, Skye jumped under the desk as the door was blown off its hinges, slamming into the wood floor of the cabin with a _crash_.

Her emotions getting the better of her, she started to quake the cabin to the point that the men were having to grab onto the walls for support. Skye crawled her way out from under the desk, cursing as her gun fell apart from her quakes. Before she had a chance to gather her bearings, she felt strong hands grabbing her shoulder and lifting her off the ground. She looked to see a huge, beefy man holding her. Kicking at him, he grunted when she landed a sharp kick to his gut. It didn’t appear to phase him too much, though, because he was handed a rag from one of the fellow guards and held it up to Skye’s face, covering her nose and mouth. Skye was aware of what he was trying to do, and held her breath, struggling for as long as she could. Soon the hunger for oxygen won, and she slumped against the guard, feeling the effects of the Chloroform.

\-------------

When Skye awoke, the first thing she noticed was the deep nausea she was feeling. Her sore wrists were bound on her lap and she felt herself in the familiar position of being strapped in a quinjet seat. She hoped she was safe in a SHIELD jet, but as her memories started to come back to her, she realized she was most definitely not that lucky. Her eyelids felt much too heavy, but as she opened them in slits, she found herself among the intruders from her cabin as well as more guards and none other than Daniel Whitehall. Groaning, in part from the drugs and in part from frustration, Skye shifted her weight on the seat, trying to prevent herself from vomiting onto the floor.

“Ah, you’re awake,” Whitehall exclaimed with a smug smile, leaning forward on his seat to get a closer look at his new prisoner.

Skye groaned again, feeling weak and sick. “I thought you died,” she mumbled, closing her eyes from the pain.

He chuckled maniacally, leaning back and crossing his legs. “Your fathers were too busy dog-fighting and let me escape.”

“Alright, I’ll humor you, old man; what do you want with me?” She sighed, opening her eyes to look at the man who ruined her family.

“What do I want from you? No sweetheart, it’s what do I _need_ from you,” he said while tapping a hand on her knee. “You see, what I want to do with you is what I did with your mother. Just imagine, the man with two powers!” He gave her the widest serial-killer smile she’d ever seen, and Skye was left wishing the Chloroform had gone ahead and killed her.

The drugs must have messed up her perception of time, because before she could even comprehend it, she felt the jet landing. When the ramp lowered, she was hit with a blast of icy wind. As Skye was yanked up from her spot on the jet and carried off, she didn’t bother fighting them because she knew it was useless. Skye was in for the long while and needed to save her energy.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, back with another chapter! Thank you to my partner who really gave it their all with this chapter!

As the guards pulled Skye down the hallways, she tried to keep track of the turns, but her brain was still fuzzy. The concrete was cold and scraped against her legs. She prayed that the team got her message and was looking for her. She knew what had happened to her mother and knew she could never let that happen to herself. The guards pulled her into a cell; three solid walls and a wall that was all glass, laced with metal wires, she assumed. Too strong to break easily. The light was a big surgical light that was fixed into the wall, a metal cage surrounding it to make sure no one could break it. The only furniture was a metal slab that Skye assumed she was supposed to sleep on. She looked out the glass and saw Whitehall looking at a monitor. He would occasionally look over at her, and when he noticed she was watching him he squinted his eyes, and put on a smirk. 

Hours sped by like minutes, and minutes sped by like hours. Time seemed to fold in on itself, and Skye was left nauseated all along. Slowly, though, she started to regain her strength. The buzzing feeling beneath her skin gradually came back, and she smirked, her escape plans running through her mind. Once Whitehall looked away, she let her emotions free, shaking the entire room. She tried to direct it toward the glass but nothing shattered, not even a crack. Frustrated, she kept trying until she felt exasperated and guards started to gather near her cell. She knew she needed to save her energy.

Whitehall turned toward her, smirking and tilting his head as he walked up to the glass. He pressed a button and spoke into the intercom: “Well, sweetheart, you got my attention, are you ready to start?”

Skye put on her best brave face and responded. “You’re just wishing I’ll be your stupid lab rat!” She contemplates her response for a second. “God, that was  _ so  _ lame,” she mutters, turning her back to Whitehall.

“You’re a feisty one, sweetheart,” he responds. “I like the feisty ones, it makes it better when they finally break. Your mother fought, and when she finally gave in and I got that delicious compliance, it gave me a rush!” Whitehall sighed, lost in the memories of his past experiments. 

As if she wasn’t scared enough before, Skye was beyond terrified now. She knew she couldn’t let him see it. Sucking in a breath, she walked slightly closer to the glass, summoning her courage, and holding a hand out in defense. “Touch me and my team will make sure you never see the light of day.”

Whitehall chuckled maniacally. “Oh, dear Skye, the only one in this room who will never see the light of day is you.” He leaned into the glass. “By the time your precious team gets here…” He smirked. “...you will be unrecognizable.”

She laughed. “As unrecognizable as you? I hate to compliment you, old man, but you transformed from dinosaur to middle aged dad in the span of a few years.”

Whitehall looked down at his pristine patent-leather shoes, smirking and chuckling under his breath. “It’s nice to know that you’re still as hard-headed as you were when I first met you. I feared your powers might have already broken you.” Stepping back a step, he crossed his arms over his chest and looked at his subject. “I suppose I just have to do the honors.”

He turned and addressed the guards, gesturing to them. “Deliver the girl to the operation room.” He then looked at Skye, chiming, “See you soon, sweetheart.” He pressed a button on the desk, and gas poured into the room from a vent on the wall, making Skye pass out. 

\----------------

Skye was drowsy when she came to. She tried to move her arm but found it kept in place by a thick brown strap. She was wearing her sports bra and shorts, and her bare skin felt much too cold on the metal table she was lying on. Looking up, she saw a woman dressed in all white and a surgical mask, wiping her inner elbow with something cold. Skye knew she was about to insert an IV and she started to squirm, trying to loosen the straps as much as possible. She only succeeded in making them tighter and rubbing her skin raw.

The woman placed her hand on Skye’s head and said sternly, “Lie still, it will hurt less.” Once the IV tube was taped in place, Daniel Whitehall walked into Skye’s line of vision, wearing a surgical gown, gloves, and mask, complete with scrub cap. He looked down at Skye and smiled. “Are you ready for this, dear? This is going to hurt.”

She smirked, shaking her head. “Yeah, I totally thought you would just be giving me a pedicure, Danny.” He laughed at her response and looked at the nurse.

“Cubital,” he ordered, and the nurse handed the blood-drawing needle to him with a curt nod. Skye looked dead into his eyes the whole time, not even flinching as he inserted the needle into the vein on her other arm, attaching the tube to the blood bag. He looked to the nurse again. “Make sure you get at least two and a half pints before I get back.” He started to remove his gloves, tossing them in the biohazard bin and washing his hands.

She nodded. “Yes, sir.” Her and Skye’s eyes followed him out the door until it was just the nurse and Skye left in the room. 

Skye was now staring off into the distance, trying to take her mind off what was bound to happen as soon as Whitehall walked back through the door. It came as a surprise to Skye when the nurse started talking: “What’s on your mind?”

Skye sighed, directing her attention to the woman next to her. “Oh, I don’t know, the new puppy Coulson promised me when I get back from being tortured.”

The nurse laughed. “You’re not being tortured, Skye. It’s science.”

Skye wiggled her arms, tubes and all. “Does it  _ look _ like I wanna be here?!”

The nurse contemplated that for a moment, watching as the blood bag slowly filled up. She had been told that all participants had been willing, and the restraints were just to make sure she didn’t hurt herself. Her mind churned with the information. “Dr. Whitehall told me all participants were willing.” Her eyes widened, darting to the girl on the table. “I’m a good person, I swear! I just needed a job. I knew it was going to be a risky one but I didn’t know you were being held against your will--” 

“Hey,” Skye said. “It’s okay, I get it, you’re in a tough spot.” The brunette was getting a bit out of breath, as the blood kept draining from her arm. “Listen, you need to get me out of here, contact my team, anything. Whitehall is going to do to me what he did to my mother when I was a baby and I probably won’t survive. Please, I beg of you.” 

“I-I can’t,” the nurse responded. She knew it was a lame thing to say to the girl who she just learned was a prisoner, but this was vital. “He will take my kids, I can’t lose them.” She began to cry.

“Woah, hey.” Skye managed to move her fingers so that she was touching the other woman’s arm. “What’s your name?”

“I’m Kathy,” she replied, sniffling and wiping her nose with the back of her arm.

Skye plastered on a smile. She was starting to feel weak but she had a feeling Kathy was her only way out of this situation. “Okay Kathy, as you know, I’m Skye, and I’m not gonna let anything happen to you or your kids, I promise.”

Kathy bit her lip, thinking about what Skye had offered. Before she could respond, the door started to swing open and both women looked away from each other. Kathy walked over to check the blood bag, trying to busy herself so Whitehall wouldn’t be suspicious.

“How many pints are we up to now, Ms. Bailey?” he asked, sliding on a fresh pair of gloves.

“Two point six, doctor,” she replied, biting her lip and avoiding eye contact with him. Unlike Skye, she wasn’t a trained operative and knew she might lose her cool at some point.

“Great, go ahead and stop the draw then,” he ordered. Kathy complied, gently removing the tube from Skye’s arm and pressing a cotton ball to the bleeding vein.

The young agent was looking extremely pale, and her lips were cracked from the amount of blood they were taking. Kathy knew that she would need to increase her blood sugar soon if she wanted her to stay conscious. 

Whitehall clicked his tongue as he approached his subject, pursing his lips. “She does look a bit weakened.” He almost felt bad; her snarky nature was fading quicker than he anticipated. 

“That’s what happens when you take the thing that, you know…” Skye coughed. “...gives people life.”

Whitehall sighed with a smile. “I was hoping to test some of your powers while we get your blood synthesized. Sadly you’re a bit too weak; I forget you’re different from your mother.”

Skye scoffed as he walked over to his supplies table, grabbing a syringe and a bottle. He stuck the needle inside and drew out the contents. “Some adrenaline should do.” Approaching Skye, he stuck the needle in her upper arm, making her wince. Kathy knitted her eyebrows; the girl had been so brave thus far and it killed her to see her fading. 

In a matter of seconds, the two Hydra agents found themselves grabbing onto the wall for support as Skye started shaking the room with her abilities.

“Skye!” Whitehall shouted over the loud clinking noises in the room as supplies crashed to the floor. “You need to comply. Direct your powers inward.”

“I...can’t!” Skye yelled, tears welling up in her eyes from the pain as her arms started to feel the effects of her powers. Eventually she was able to quell the quakes, but not before screaming as she felt her own still-healing bones snap. Kathy had to close her eyes to compose herself and found herself unwillingly putting a hand on Skye’s head. Whitehall shot the nurse a glare and she immediately pulled away, folding her hands in front of her and blushing from embarrassment.

He nodded to Kathy. “Go ahead and push more power repression into her IV.” Sucking in a breath, the nurse complied, mentally apologizing to Skye for all she’d done.

Skye’s eyes were only open in slits and she was close to passing out. Whitehall approached the table. “Scalpel,” he ordered Kathy. The woman regretfully handed the tool to the doctor. He looked at Skye’s arm, and pressed the knife into her flesh, blood beads on the tool.

Skye began to scream, the pain too much to handle as her nerves were split apart. She’d never experienced this much pain in her life. Her arm burning and her chest tightening, her body gave out and everything faded to darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's all for now, another chapter will be out sometime soon. Please review with your thoughts! Love ya!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My co author wrote this entire chapter, so thank them in the comments please!

“Skye!” Jemma chimed cheerfully, smiling as she walked across the grassy lawn leading up to her friend’s new temporary home. The biochemist had brought Skye some new supplies and wanted to check on her healing arms. “Skye?” she said more quietly, her smile slowly fading as she approached the house. She had to stop herself from gasping when she saw the door knocked clean off its hinges and lying cracked on the floor. Touching the gun tucked into the back of her jeans, she kept herself alert as she roamed through the cabin, setting the grocery bag and first aid kit on the kitchen counter. She slid her gun out, aiming it so she would be prepared to shoot. 

The biochemist furrowed her brow when she saw a broken gun on the floor. Crouching, she inspected it, noticing it was Skye’s. Her eyes widening, she stood, finding a dirty rag on the floor nearby. She concluded that whoever was here was now gone.

Simmons grabbed a sample bag from her first aid kit and carefully placed the rag inside, tucking the bag back into the kit as she pulled out her phone. 

_ “Simmons? What is it?” _ May asked from the other end of the line.

“May, Skye isn’t here. I think she’s been kidnapped.”

“ _Kidnapped?”_ May hesitated for a while. “ _What happened to the security measures?_ ” She nodded at an agent walking by to inform Coulson.

“How can you say that so casually?! And I don’t know, May! I don’t know…” She buried her head in her hands, tears already beginning to form. “I found a rag and her gun was shattered. Everything fell on the floor, I think she quaked, I-”

May sighed. “ _Jemma_ , you need to stay calm. We may not know where Skye is, but we will find her.”

“May...May what if she’s already gone?? Everyone thinks she’s an abomination...what if they eliminated the threat..?”

“ _J_ _emma-_ ”

“No, May!” Jemma cried, the tears streaming down her cheeks. She clutched a piece of the broken gun that once belonged to Skye. “How can you be so calm about this? Skye is missing…” Her voice broke.

“ _Jemma, not everyone wants to kiss Skye as much as you do,_ ” May muttered. 

The girl was taken aback. She opened her mouth to say something but stopped herself, furrowing her brow. After a moment, she responded, “Regardless, we need to find her. I’ll be here, but I need someone to bring testing supplies and a team.”

“ _Coulson’s working on it_ ,” she told her. “ _Jemma, please stay safe. Stay in the bedroom with the blinds closed. We don’t want anyone knowing you’re there._ ”

“Yes, okay.” She sucked in a deep breath through her nose. “I hope she’s okay.”

“ _Me too, Jemma, me too._ ”

\--------------

Simmons’s heart began to pound when she heard rapping on the open door frame. Clutching her gun, she opened the bedroom door and crept out, heaving a sigh of relief when she saw the father figure of the team.

“ _Coulson,_ ” she gasped, lowering her gun. She heaved a sigh of relief. “How are you here? You’ve got a lot of things to deal with at the Playground, I…”

  
“It’s Skye,” was his response. He set his bag down on the floor next to him. “I’d give my life for her. We need to find her.”

Jemma nodded as she watched a team of agents enter the cabin, already beginning to search everything. May walked in behind all of them and nodded at Jemma, holding her hand out.

“Can I see the bag?”

The scientist reached into her first aid kit, removing the plastic bag with the rag in it. May walked it over to another science agent and he began to work on testing it.

“How are you, Jemma?” Coulson asked. He and May were studying her closely, as if she was a delicate piece of china about to shatter.

The girl’s eyes darted from May to Coulson and back to May. She sighed. “I’ll be better when I know where Skye is.”

“I already have Fitz running a team looking into the surveillance cameras and checking the security system. Hunter is searching the woods for signs of vehicles, footprints, whatever. We need to find out how this was able to happen,” Coulson told her. 

Jemma nodded, chewing on her thumbnail. “I need to find out what drug is on the rag. If it’s a minor drug there’s a good chance her assailant’s intentions were to capture, not kill.”

“You’re right,” May said, approaching the agent who had been testing the rag. “Kendrick, what is it?”

The man squinted at the small device in his hands. He turned to the three superior agents. “It’s Chloroform.”

All eyes went to Jemma. She swallowed, her eyes staring down at the floor in deep thought. “That’s not good,” she whispered under her breath.

Seeing that his fellow scientist was not at her best, Kendrick spoke up: “Agent Simmons means to say that Chloroform can go a few ways. On one hand, too much of it can most certainly kill you. Luckily, there isn’t too much in this rag from what I’ve found. This amount was probably enough to get Skye sick and make her pass out.”

Coulson shook his head and May closed her eyes. Jemma was still staring off into the distance. Taking note of this, the older woman gently grabbed Jemma’s shoulders, leading her over to the couch.

“Come on, Jemma, let’s sit down,” she said quietly as she sat the girl down. She seated herself on the cushion next to her.

“I hope it was the Real SHIELD,” Jemma said to May. “They wanted Skye anyway.” She turned to look at the older agent. 

“You know she wouldn’t have gone down without a fight,” May said.

Simmons nodded. “Which is exactly why the place is a wreck. She quaked everything.”

“But Simmons, I doubt the Real SHIELD would have drugged her. They never wanted to hurt-”

“How can you be so sure??” Jemma asked, scowling and turning her entire body to face May. “We have /no/ idea what they wanted with her. We have no idea how far they’d go.”

There were a few long minutes of silence before May wrapped Jemma into her arms, allowing the girl to cry all she wanted. The agents around them thought nothing of it; they knew May was oddly the comforter of the team. 

“Well, we know it wasn’t the Real SHIELD,” came a thickly-accented English voice from the doorway. Hunter and Fitz stood in front of the door, the former dangling a gun from his fingers.

“H3L-A Energy Rifle, exclusive to Hydra,” Fitz informed everyone somberly. “We found blurry footage of a quinjet and men in Hydra uniforms.” He straightened his stance. “Hydra took Skye.”

The room fell silent. Jemma shook her head and buried her face in the back of the couch. May stood, brushing off her thighs and walking over to her fellow agents. “Any ideas as to why?” she asked.

Coulson bit his lip. “I might have one.”

Everyone raised their eyebrows, egging on his response. The man sighed, biting his cheek and scratching his neck. “Well, as you know, Daniel Whitehall, AKA Reinhardt, de-aged himself by taking Skye’s mother’s powers.” He bit his lip to the point it drew blood. “I know he wants to do the same to Skye.”   
  


Jemma was trembling, her eyes as wide as the mouth of a beluga whale. “That- That would require him to remove a decent amount of blood from Skye. She...without her mother’s healing powers, Skye will die, not to mention the trauma...”

Coulson and May eyed each other, silently planning their next move. He turned to the young engineer. “Fitz, keep working on finding where their Hydra quinjet is headed. Let’s get moving.” He looked at Jemma. “We’re going to find her before Whitehall gets what he wants.”

\----------

“No, Jemma, what I’m saying is that if we-”

Coulson’s phone ringing interrupted May. “It’s Skye,” he told them, eyeing his phone. Looking up at his fellow agents, both women nodded as he answered the call, holding his phone up to his ear. “Hello?”

There was no response. He waited a moment before muting himself. “Fitz,” he said to the young agent across the room. “Can you track this?”

Fitz approached Coulson, taking the phone out of his hands. “Yes, sir, we’ll have to stay on the call for a few more moments, though.”

“Not a problem on our end.”

“ _Did you prep...scalpel...antibacterial..._ ” came a man’s voice from the other end. It was patchy and scratchy, yet unmistakably Whitehall; the area clearly had poor cell service.

“ _Yes...tient is read…_ ” came a shaky, more feminine voice. “ _...Need a few...hours…_ ”

Phil tightened his jaw in fear. He knew they needed to get to Skye, and fast.

Fitz was plugging the phone into a computer. “Ready,” he informed everyone a moment later. After working on his laptop for the longest three minutes of everyone’s lives, he stepped back, displaying the screen for all to see. “They’re in the arctic (or insert location). It’s an old Hydra base built specifically for Doctor List. But…” He pointed to a photo of an old man on the screen. “Daniel Whitehall took it over. Lots of scientific studies were conducted here during the Cold War, mainly about enhanced soldiers. Whitehall was seemingly overseeing them from his prison cell. Though they were mostly unsuccessful, they did manage to protect all the research when SHIELD tried to infiltrate it.”

“That good-for-nothing fossil,” May muttered, crossing her arms over her chest and scoffing.

Fitz sighed. “This base should only take around four hours to get to by quinjet.”

Jemma raised her eyebrows, holding a hand out. “Well, what are we waiting for?! Let’s go!” She started to head out the door.

Fitz held up a hand. “Wait.” All eyes went to him. He bit his lip. “I think it’s a trap. Why would Skye call if she didn’t say anything? Someone’s obviously stolen her phone and is trying to lure us in. How do we even know Skye is there? The odds might be in our favor, but they’re never 100 percent.”

“Aw Fitz.”

“Are you serious?”

“This is Skye we’re talking about.”

“It’s bloody Skye, mate.”

Coulson stepped forward, putting a hand on Fitz’s shoulder. “I think we’re all willing to take this risk. This is Skye we’re talking about. She’s family, and we’d do the same thing for you.”

Fitz sighed and silently nodded his head in agreement, rubbing the back of his neck shamefully.

“Alright, then let’s do this,” Jemma declared, grabbing her bag. “Let’s save Skye.”

May gestured to the lawn with her head. “Wheels up in ten.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's all for now, happy holidays. Please stay safe, we probably won't be able to type together until after our birthdays in January! Love ya guys! Please review with your thoughts.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi y'all!   
> I hope you all had a good holiday! Sorry it took us so long to get another chapter out, we both have been very busy. I will explain more in end notes. As always, so many thanks to my co author!

When Skye woke up, all she felt was pain: in her arms, deep in her chest, her head... _ everywhere _ . Her eyes blinked open, and she noticed she was back in her cell. When she took stock of her body, she made sure to note the bandages that clung to her arms. 

“Ugh, what the hell!” Skye exclaimed as she tried to move her fingers. It felt like her brain wasn’t wired to her hands anymore, and they just hung limp when she sat up on the metal cot. She looked out the window and saw Whitehall staring in at her. 

She summoned her courage and pushed off the bed, her wrists collapsing under her weight. “You motherf--” The world darkened around her as she passed out onto the floor, hitting her head on the metal slab on the way down. 

\-------

“Skye, honey. Skye?” came a vaguely familiar voice. Skye’s ears were ringing and her head was spinning, but she could feel someone gently tapping their fingers to her cheekbone.

The girl mumbled in response, hoping that this person would understand she was alive.

The other person heaved a sigh of relief and stopped tapping her. “Skye, it’s Kathy. Whitehall wanted me to make sure you were still alive.”

“Mm, unfortunately,” she muttered, knitting her eyebrows and leaning to the side to cough. “You can go back to whatever you were doing.”

“ _Skye,_ ” she exclaimed, her voice stern. Skye opened her eyes and took in Kathy’s worried expression. “Skye, this is your final chance. Whitehall told me of his plans. He’s going to…” She closed her eyes, shaking her head in dismay. “You’re not going to make it out of here alive if we let him continue.” Skye’s heart raced and her eyes widened as she looked out the window of her cell, watching a group of guards walk by. “Skye, let me contact your team. I don’t care how much trouble this gets me in, I need to get you out of this.” Kathy shook her head in disbelief. “I can’t let him do this to you.”

Skye was already starting to pass out, her head throbbing as black spots filled her vision. She managed to give Kathy Coulson’s number before fading into the void once again.

\---------

  
  
  


The next time Skye came to, she was back under the blinding lights of the OR. On top of all her previous injuries, she felt aching pains in her back and neck. Groaning at the bright light over her sore head, she tried to shield her eyes from it, only to remember that she was tied to the table. She bit her lip, trying to distract herself from the dizzy state she was in. Opening her eyes slightly, she watched Whitehall, who had his back to her. He was preparing something, she presumed, and wasn’t so sure she wanted to experience whatever this something was.

Looking to her right, Kathy was pressing a cotton ball to Skye’s stomach, an empty syringe balancing in her fingers.

“What are you…” Skye croaked, her throat raspy from screaming so much earlier. She squinted. “...Kathy, what is that?”

The nurse eyed Whitehall before leaning in close to the young agent. “It’s a local anesthetic, Skye. I was able to convince the doctor to use it.” Giving Skye one last look of pity, she turned to her superior. “The patient is ready, doctor.”

Whitehall nodded, pleased. “Very good. Thank you, Ms. Bailey.”

Her heart racing, Skye watched with groggy eyes as the man approached her, holding his hand out. “Scalpel,” he ordered. The agent would have been shaking with fear had her body not been chained down. “Please disinfect the surgical site.”

Kathy reluctantly used a sponge stick to wipe Skye’s right midsection with iodine. The material was cold and made Skye flinch a bit against her restraints.

“Now, dear, you might as well get comfortable because we’re in for the long run,” Whitehall whispered to her, placing his gloved hand on her forehead. 

Trembling as Kathy handed Whitehall the scalpel, Skye watched as he lowered it onto her abdomen and it slowly sank inside her skin. She sucked in a breath; though she couldn’t technically feel the pain, she knew this would hurt like hell later, if she survived until then, that is.

Kathy looked up to her superior. “I don’t understand why you can’t use general anesthetic, sir. She’s-”

Daniel held up a hand to stop her. “I don’t want to hear it, Bailey. This experiment needs to determine the limits of gifted individuals and we cannot successfully do so if she is asleep, now can we?” He shot her a wide, creepy grin.

“N-No sir,” the nurse replied.

“Good, I had a feeling that little chat you had with Miss Skye before would turn you soft.” He pulled apart Skye’s flesh with clamps, and the agent groaned at the tugging feeling and turned her head to the side.

Kathy froze, her eyes widening. “You- I- You heard-”

Whitehall chuckled as he widened the clamps, dabbing away the blood with a lap pad. “I’m sure you’ll comply when little Finley’s life is at stake,” he threatened. Kathy shook her head.

“Please, okay, I’m sorry! Please, just don’t hurt him…”

Whitehall nodded to the door as he grabbed another tool. “Then get out of my operating room. Now.”

Kathy leaned in, cupping Skye’s face as she looked into her pleading eyes. “Stay strong,” she whispered to Skye before two guards burst in, grabbing Kathy’s arms and dragging her away. Skye watched as the only other person on her side was yanked from the room, tears stinging her eyes like the scalpel stinging her body. 

\-----------

Kathy tried to keep up with the guards, but every time she got good footing, she was pulled faster down the hallway. She tried to pay attention to the labyrinth of hallways and she was pulled away from Skye.  _ Left, Left, Left, Right, Bang!  _ Suddenly the guard who was holding her right arm fell to the ground, a neat bullet hole in the center of his forehead. 

The second guard yanked Kathy to cover, reaching for his alarm but falling before he could hit it. This time, the bullet hole was on the right side of his head. Kathy spun around, and came face to face with a short, raven-haired woman, who was pointing a gun at her. 

“W-Who are you?” Kathy stuttered. Her hands were raised above her head.

“Who I am is not any of your concern. Who are you, and what have you done with Skye?” the woman inquired, stepping closer to Kathy.

  
  
  


“Skye!” Kathy felt relief flood her body. “You must be her team. You’ve got to help her; she’s in bad shape.”

“How do we know you didn’t contribute to this?” the man standing next to the woman asked, his gun raised as well. He nodded at her outfit. “You’ve got blood stains on your gown, love.” His thick English accent made it hard to take him seriously.

“I’ve been trying to help the best I can. I’m a nurse here, but I didn’t know Skye was taken away...I-I called a man on her phone, I think his name was Coulson?” She shook her head, trying to think. “That’s what Skye called him,” she whispered. When Kathy said this, the agents faltered.

“You’re the one who called?” The man addressed Kathy. “What did you say your name was?”

“I didn’t say, but it’s Kathy. I just want to help Skye, I swear. The only reason I’m here is because they have my kids.” 

The black-haired woman squinted and pursed her lips, lowering her gun slightly. “I’m Agent May from SHIELD.” She nodded towards her accomplice. “This is Hunter. We know Skye well. Do you have any idea where she is?”

Kathy nodded in reply, her eyes wide. “She’s um, she’s down a few hallways…” The nurse closed her eyes, trying to remember where the guards had taken her. “It’s the most secure OR we have around here. Not much happens here these days, so your friend is a top priority. There are tons of guards surrounding her.” 

“Who is this?” came a distant male voice. A small woman dressed in a dress shirt and dark jeans approached the group, followed by a middle-aged man, concerned looks across both of their faces.

May sighed. “This is Kathy. She’s a nurse here and she’s the one who called you.”

“Do you know where Skye is?” Coulson asked the nurse.

Kathy nodded. “Follow me, but I’ll need your help to get through the guards. I can’t let them hurt my children…”

“Hunter, you work on finding Kathy’s kids. Everyone else, let’s go get Skye,” Coulson ordered. Heads were nodded around the group and they started down the hallways.

“What are they doing to her?” the small woman, Jemma, asked Kathy as May shot down two guards blocking a doorway.

“He’s taken a significant amount of blood from her and lacerated her arms, drugged her, taken spinal fluid and lymph nodes, cut open her torso...he’s trying to take her organs now to be studied and possibly synthesized,” the nurse replied.

Jemma’s eyes widened and her chest tightened. “Dear God…”

Kathy sighed as they crept down the hallway. Coulson knocked out a guard by kicking him in the gut. “She’s still alive, but we need to get to her soon if we want her to stay that way.”

“Well, let's not waste any more time talking then,” Coulson said as he turned his head back to the group. They all quickened their pace down the hallway, eager to find Skye. “The longer we take looking, the higher chance someone will stumble upon the bodies, and pull the alarm.” 

Kathy gulped; she knew if the alarm was tripped, Skye would be dead for sure. “Hurry up, it’s this way, we are almost there.” They quickly passed the last few corridors, and the team was faced with a window looking in on Skye’s operation room. The sight was gruesome at best. 

Whitehall stood bent over her body, his gown covered in her blood. His eyes were squinted in concentration. As lifted his hand, a piece of Skye was in it. The group gagged. “Did he just remove a part of her liver?” Jemma asked, tears in her eyes. 

“Yes,” Kathy responded somberly, her back now to the window. She couldn’t bear to watch any more. 

Just then, the alarm started blaring and when Whitehall looked up, he saw the team in the window. 

\-------------

Whitehall stood over Skye. The girl had long since lost consciousness. He was currently working on taking part of her liver to transplant into himself in hopes of gaining properties of being enhanced. Setting the tissue in an ice bath, he nodded at the guards near the door. The four beefy men clutched their rifles and stormed out of the OR, marching toward the team. The agents ducked behind an empty gurney, knocking it over to make a shield of sorts.

“I’ll cover for you!” Coulson shouted to the women over the clanking of the bullets against metal. He loaded his gun and prepared it. “You all go get Whitehall and fix Skye!”

“If we can,” Jemma whispered quietly, her eyes watering. 

“Are you sure, Phil?” May asked Coulson, knitting her eyebrows with concern. 

He nodded. “Yes, of course. Please go save Skye for me.” He looked into her eyes and May clearly saw the hurt in them. She knew they couldn’t let Skye die. 

“Let’s go!” May shouted at the two younger women, gesturing to them to follow her. As Coulson distracted the guards with his gunfire, the women were able to slip past, but not without Kathy taking a bullet to her forearm. She yelped and almost fell, but Jemma was able to catch her before they made it into the OR.

“Hands up, Whitehall,” May hissed when the swinging doors shut behind her. She clenched her teeth as her gun was aimed right at the madman.

Jemma and the whimpering Kathy were staring at Skye, who was bleeding out on the operating table. 

Whitehall smirked, raising his bloodied hands above his head. “You’re too late. My science team is already preparing Skye’s blood to be transplanted into me. Soon she will bleed out and die, and I will be the only man in the world with earthquake powers.”

“Is that so?” May inquired, adjusting her grip on the weapon. Coulson, his breathing heavy, stumbled into the OR. He looked like he’d seen a ghost when his eyes landed on Skye.

Whitehall smiled smugly as Kathy and Jemma approached Skye, starting to try and keep her alive. “Good luck with that,” he muttered, chuckling. “She’ll never again see the light of day, just like I sai—”

_Bang_. Just like that, Whitehall dropped to the floor, a bullet through his chest. His blood pooled on the floor. 

Kathy’s eyes widened and her heart rate quickened. 

“Here,” Jemma said to the nurse, handing her some gauze. The girl had switched to full-on Doctor Simmons mode, not paying attention to the murder she had just witnessed; her best friend’s life was on the line. Kathy wrapped the graze wound on her own arm. Jemma was grabbing medicines and syringes off the table and injecting them in Skye’s IV bag. “We need to stop the bleeding,” she ordered. Nodding, Kathy grabbed lap pads and whatever she possibly thought she’d need, pressing them into the massive wound on Skye’s stomach. 

May and Coulson started toward the operating table but were interrupted when a massive blue orb of light appeared in the middle of the OR. As the light disappeared, a man with no eyes and a woman with scars across her face appeared. 

May raised her gun at them. “Who the hell are you?” she snapped.

“SHIELD’s here,” the woman hissed, disgust obvious in her tone. She eyed the two women who were working on Skye. “What have you done with her?!”

“ _We_ haven’t done anything,” Coulson explained. He pointed to the dead man on the floor. “It’s him.”

“Reinhardt,” the woman whispered under her breath, her heart quickening. She swallowed, wrapping her arms around her own torso as she remembered the pain he inflicted upon her so long ago.

“Who are you and how did you get in here?!” May demanded.

“I’m Jiaying, the leader of the Inhumans,” The mystery woman, Jiaying, answered. “Also, I think you just saw how we got here. Gordon here, is a teleporter.”

“What do you want with Skye?” Coulson asked while looking over at Jemma and Kathy who were working feverishly on Skye. 

“I’m here to save…” She trailed off. “...the Inhuman who is currently half dead on that table over there. Skye, did you say?”

The senior agents shared a concerned glance. “How do we know to trust you?” May asked.

“Because you have no other choice,” Jiaying said casually as she approached the three young women.

Jemma sighed, finally stepping back from the table and wiping the sweat from her forehead with the back of her arm. “She’ll be okay,” she declared, swallowing the lump in her throat and catching her breath.. “She’s stable for now, though I will be more confident when we get back to base, and I can take a proper look.” She sighed, removing a glove and putting her bare hand on Skye’s cheek, taking in the girl’s still-pained expression. “Assess all the damage.”

“I have plenty of files on the experiments I can access for you,” Kathy told her. 

Jemma closed her eyes and nodded, pressing her index finger and thumb to the bone in between her eyes. Seeing that the biochemist needed some space, the agents began shuffling out. Jiaying stayed with Jemma while Kathy and May went to find the files and then Hunter and the kids. Coulson and Gordon stood guard right inside the door, both keeping close watch on the people inside.

“How did Skye find her way into your…” Jiaying squinted her eyes as she approached the two younger women. “...organization?”   
  


Jemma pressed her lips together. “She...I’d like to think it was fate, but to put it simply, she hacked her way in.”   
  


Jiaying nodded. “Ahh.”

A moment of awkward silence passed.

“You know…” Jiaying placed her hand on Skye’s shoulder, feeling the touch of her daughter’s skin for the first time in 25 years. Usually, Jiaying was cold and emotionless, but seeing her child motionless and helpless like this almost brought her back to her past self. She felt a warm tear welling up in her eye and felt its wetness trickle down her cheek.

“Hey! You get your hands off her! She’s hardly stable,” Jemma scolded, swatting Jiaying’s hand away. The older woman snapped out of her reverie and shook her head, wiping her tears with the back of her hand.

“I’m- I’m sorry, I...I’m not sure what happened there,” she mumbled. She swallowed, shaking her head and straightening back up. She locked eyes with the young biochemist. “I need her to come with us.”

Jemma knitted her eyebrows, taking Skye’s hand in her own protectively. “What? We barely know you, let alone trust you with her- ”

Coulson heard Simmons’s raised voice and turned away from Gordon, looking toward the little scientist with concern. He approached them. “What’s going on?” He furrowed his brow.

Jiaying turned, narrowing her eyes at the man and clenching her fist in anger. “This girl does not belong to you. She is Inhuman. SHIELD is no place for gifted people.”

“We can help her control her gift,” Gordon added, walking up to the group with his hands folded behind his back. He looked down at Skye. “She belongs with us.”

“The hell she does,” Coulson muttered, reaching to his holster to touch his gun. Jiaying clenched her teeth and set her jaw.

“Settle down now, everyone,” Gordon said, raising his hands to try to make peace. “We don’t mean any harm.”

Suddenly, the group was interrupted by the OR doors swinging open. In came May, Kathy, Hunter, and Kathy’s children. Hunter was holding a rope with both children grasping it.

Coulson looked the group up and down dubiously. “I see you found the kids,” he said.

Hunter smirked, pulling on the rope as the kids giggled from the sudden jostling. “Had to keep ‘um in line somehow.”

“We’re not running a daycare,” Coulson sighed disappointedly.

“Simmons,” May nodded to the scientist. “You might want to take a look at the kids to make sure they didn’t hurt them.”

Jemma nodded, stepping away from Skye and kneeling down to the boy’s eye level. “Hey, are you Finley?” she asked, her voice full of kindness. 

He nodded, looking up at the woman with innocence in his eyes. He looked over to the operating table, pointing to Skye. “Is that lady okay?”

Jemma’s mouth formed an “O” and she turned, gasping when she saw Jiaying and Gordon huddled over Skye.

May yelled before ripping out her ICER and shooting both Inhumans. They fell to the ground, limp.

The children stared in horror, not sure of how to react. Kathy ran to them, wrapping her arms around them and turning their attention away from the action.

“Good job, May,” Coulson said as he walked up to Skye, running his hand down her arm to make sure they hadn’t hurt her. “I’m not sure _what_ they would’ve done.”

The young agent began to stir slightly, her face contorting into pained expressions. “M-May…” she mumbled. Melinda ran up to her surrogate daughter immediately, stroking her head. 

“I’m right here, love, right here,” she hushed, knitting her eyebrows together.

Skye nodded with her eyes closed and swallowed. “I love you,” she whispered before drifting back into a deep sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's all for now guys! So much has happened these past months, both of us (the authors) had our birthdays! Also I had a bit of a Covid scare, I'm okay, just a cold. Leave a review if you enjoyed, or not, any response is welcome.

**Author's Note:**

> That's all for now! Please give us your feedback. We already have our second chapter written which is significantly longer than this one.


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